A pervasive problem that plagues animal breeding is determining the optimum time a female should be inseminated. Breeding bovine animals is made easier when an accurate determination can be made as to when a cow should be artificially inseminated. Generally, cows in heat are near ovulation and let themselves be mounted. Accurately determining when a cow is in heat, and hence should be inseminated, is important because of the scarcity of resources necessary to provide a successful insemination, the expense of those materials, and because the opportunity costs of failed inseminations are great. With respect to bovine animals, millions of dollars worth of semen is wasted each year because of unsuccessful inseminations, the vast majority of which were poorly timed.
Prior attempts have been made to determine when a cow is in heat. In one prior-art method, the animals are simply observed. When mating behavior is observed, a breeder determines whether to act. But such a method is impractical in light of the demands associated with physically observing many animals over long periods of time.
The SHOWHEAT device made by the IMV International Corporation of Minneapolis, Minn. is an exemplary prior-art device that is designed to help determine when a cow is in heat. But, this device makes an actual timing determination. Rather than providing raw data, which a skilled person could include as a factor in determining whether a certain time is the best time to commence insemination, prior-art devices remove the decision-making process from a breeder. Raw data related to recent animal behavior is not provided.
To illustrate this mere one shortcoming of the prior art, consider a group of females outfitted with prior-art devices. In situations where multiple prior-art devices simultaneously indicated that many females are ready for insemination, a breeder would be deprived of valuable information indicating which of the animals should be inseminated first. That is, if a herd of cows were gathered after a certain period of time, and multiple cows were flagged as ready for insemination, prior-art devices merely indicate that at some point the specific cows were ready to be inseminated, if such a determination was accurate. This problem is exacerbated when limited insemination equipment is available. Limited time may require deciding which cows to inseminate first, but the prior-art attempts do not provide a way to retrieve this data.
Another shortcoming of the prior art is the inability to retrieve historical data. This historical data could be used to better understand the mating-behavior events or behavior leading up to ovulation. Without this historical data, a breeder does not have as much information on which to base an insemination decision.
Still another shortcoming of various prior-art attempts is the recordation of false positives. A false positive erroneously indicates that a mount took place. For example, certain ineloquent males or females who lack the mounting prowess of others may fumble while attempting to mount a female. Thus, while attempting to register what should be considered a single successful mount, prior-art devices may erroneously register multiple mounting attempts as actual mounts.
Still another shortcoming of the prior art is that the historical devices are physically large, making them difficult to securely attach to the animal, such as bovine animals. Large devices are also difficult to maintain attached to the bovine animal during mounting behavior.
A final illustrative shortcoming of prior-art devices is the manner in which they provide feedback. Typically, prior-art devices do not provide detailed feedback in such a manner that is easy to observe from a safe or comfortable distance. A dairy farmer may have only a short time frame to read from many devices. Not being able to readily observe indications of mounting behavior or other breeding behavior (especially in its raw format) imposes resource burdens on a breeder.
There is a need for a method and system that more accurately tracks mating-behavior events and presents data related to those events so as to enable a decision maker to determine an optimum insemination time. The prior art could be improved by a device that provides raw data corresponding to mating-behavior events, thereby enabling a more complete, informed insemination decision to be made. The prior art could also be improved by providing a device that logs historical data related to mating behavior leading up to ovulation and that reduces the occurrence of false positives. The state of the art could be improved by providing a device with a sufficiently narrow footprint and low profile that would make attachment and retention to an animal easier and more reliable. Still further, the state of the art could be improved by providing a device that includes only a single actuator (button or switch) for data input.